New Railway Terminal to be Set Up in Gurugram: Suresh Prabhu

Railway minister Suresh Prabhu announced that a new rail terminal, having world-class facilities, will be set up in Gurugram to reduce the mounting pressure on Delhi.

"The work on this project will start soon. Besides, Rohtak railway station will be developed as a model station under public-private-partnership (PPP) mode," he said at a programme organised by the Northern Railways here.

Prabhu dedicated the newly-electrified railway section between Rohtak and Jind to the people and extended greetings on the occasion of Ram Navami to them. Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar was present on the occasion.

The Union minister also flagged-off a new DEMU train between Jind and Sonipat through video conference and said tender for Rohtak-Meham-Hansi railway line will be finalised in Augusta and the work in expected to be completed by the end of December, 2019.

The proposed Rail Coach Factory in Sonipat district would be developed on PPP mode and work on this will start at the earliest, Prabhu said. Informing that electrification work has been completed on about 42 per cent of the total rail network in the state he said, "This figure will be doubled in the next five years."

The railways will save Rs 41,000 crore in coming 10 years by installing solar power plants, wind power plants and LED lights, Prabhu said, adding with an aim to promote greenery, five crore saplings are also being planted by the railways. The Union minister said investment in railways has increased to Rs 3.5 lakh crore in the last two-and-a-half years.

The present Union government has increased the annual share of Haryana in Rail Budget to Rs 1,247 crore for 2017-18, which was Rs 314 crore from 2009 to 2014, he said. Survey work on the 55-km long Yamunanagar-Jagadhari- Kurukshetra-Ladwa link and 65-km on Kaithal-Patiala link has been approved for this fiscal, Prabhu said.

Speaking on the occasion, Khattar thanked the Railway Minister for the new rail projects and said work on elevated railway line on Rohtak-Gohana stretch has already started which would help in decongesting traffic in Rohtak.

"This is the first-ever elevated rail track of Indian railways being built for smoother road traffic in densely populated areas. The work on this project will soon be completed," the Chief Minister said. He said provision of Rs 100 crore has been made in this budget for joint venture projects to be undertaken with the railways.

Haryana's Finance Minister, Abhimanyu, lauded the railway minister "for his initiative for eliminating the age-old system of separate budget presentation for Railways.""Now, the railway minister is making concerted efforts to accelerate the pace of development of rail infrastructure in the country. A joint venture of special purpose vehicle has been made between the railways and the state government for rapid implementation of various rails projects in the state, he said.